April 2021: Building Bridges | Diversity, Equity & Inclusion | Workplace Culture | Innovation

We are on a mission to open minds, one book at a time! Did you know that when you bring an author to your organization or place a bulk book order with us that you are supporting this mission, too?

In February 2018, with assistance from a DC-area author, Hooks Book Events kicked off a new program — HBE Bridge Builder Events. Our goal for these events is to provide DC-area students access to America’s thought leaders with in-person and now virtual book and author talks, as well as exposure to poetry writing, art, and yoga. Our internal motto for these is, “If we get to do it, the students get to do it!”

With generous support from our friends at Companies for Causes (CFC), under the leadership of Tom Raffa, our funds were housed and managed.

Our first CFC/BBE author event was held on February 21, 2018, at Anacostia High School, with author Kondwani Fidel and his (then) recent book Raw Wounds. Over these three years, HBE has hosted 46 events at 12 schools, clubs, academies, centers, and gatherings. Of those 46 events, wellness expert Brandon Copeland has hosted 11 yoga and health classes, providing much needed stress-relieving mindfulness techniques for students. We have produced seven additional author events for students with Kondwani Fidel, and have supplied books for book clubs at Ballou High School.

We have given away 1,730 books, and in 2020 HBE made monetary donations to six non-profit companies that focused on hunger, literacy, and more. By year-end 2020, we had drawn down our funds held with Companies for Causes, but our work continues. Over our first three years, we have touched the lives of hundreds of DC area students.

In 2021, our goal is to continue tithing our revenue from bulk book sales so that we can continue our work with area students. Our first event was held on January 28, 2021, with local DC author Keli Hammond speaking to students at the Goodwill Excel Center, an adult charter high school.

Thanks to the continued support of our clients and HBE community, we look forward to reaching our goal!

Feedback from a Recent Bridge Builder Program

In March, we hosted a Bridge Builder event for the Goodwill Excel Center in Washington, DC. On this program, we worked with Lisa Weinert, creator of Narrative Healing, a workshop “to help writers (re) connect with their bodies and share their stories in the world.”

The goal of this interactive, online program was to create a safe space for Goodwill Excel students in writing, sharing, and addressing trauma in a healing space. We’re thrilled to share this feedback from one of the students:

Authors We’re Working With Now

Explore the authors and books we’re working with now to find ideas for thought-provoking subjects you can bring to your team or organization. With ENGAGE video calls, these programs can be readily scheduled. Contact Perry for more information.

What’s Next: Books on our Know Ahead List for Summer

We continuously curate a special list of books on topics that address the executive education, DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion), technology and innovation, employee engagement, and workplace morale goals of our clients. Below are just a few of the books on our most current Know Ahead List. Do you want know what’s coming? Get the KAL!

Contact Louise to receive a copy, or to identify books on other topics for your organization.

Mercury Rising: John Glenn, John Kennedy, and the New Battleground of the Cold War (W.W. Norton, June 1, 2021), by Jeff Shesol, is a riveting history of the epic orbital flight that put America back into the space race, lifting the nation’s hopes in what Kennedy called the “hour of maximum danger.”

Reset: The Leader’s Guide to Work in an Age of Upheaval (PublicAffairs, Aug 3, 2021) presents leaders with a vision for rebuilding company cultures in a time of global upheaval and delivers practical strategies for finding and keeping the talent needed to survive and thrive. Johnny C. Taylor, Jr. is President and CEO of the Society for Human Resource Management.

Listen Like You Mean It: Reclaiming the Lost Art of True Connection (Portfolio, March 30, 2021), by Ximena Vengoechea, UX Research Manager at Pinterest, previously at Twitter and LinkedIn, teaches us how to listen better, build rapport and ask questions that help people unlock what they need to say.

Framers: Human Advantage in an Age of Technology and Turmoil (Dutton, May 11, 2021), by Kenneth Cukier, Viktor Mayer-Schönberger and Francis de Véricourt, authors of the breakout bestseller Big Data, shows how framing will be a way to improve how we make decisions in the era of algorithms, and a matter of survival for humanity in the coming age of machine prosperity.

No One Succeeds Alone: Learn Everything You Can from Everyone You Can (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, May 4, 2021) is the story of Compass CEO Robert Reffkin—born black and raised Jewish—and teaches you to dream bigger, realize your full potential, and give back by helping make someone else’s dreams come true, too.

Risk: A User’s Guide (Portfolio, Oct. 5, 2021) from Stanley McChrystal, retired four-star general and bestselling author of Team of Teams and My Share of the Task, offers a new system by which we can detect and respond to risk, improve our resistance, and build a strong defense against what we know–and what we don’t.

The Long-Distance Teammate: Stay Engaged and Connected While Working Anywhere (Berrett-Koehler, Jan. 19, 2021) tackles the important issues that allow you to be a great remote teammate. Kevin Eikenberry and Wayne Turmel are the cofounders of the Remote Leadership Institute.

Effortless: Make It Easier to Do What Matters Most (Currency, April 27, 2021), from Greg McKeown, bestselling author of Essentialism, offers simple strategies for making the most essential activities the easiest ones, so you can achieve the results you want.

Beating Burnout at Work: Why Teams Hold the Secret to Well-Being and Resilience (Wharton School Press, March 16, 2021), by Paula Davis, takes a holistic approach to prevent burnout, which has accelerated during the pandemic, by helping teams as well as individuals.

Bulk Book Orders Support Local DC Students

Let Hooks Book Events fill all of your book ordering needs. Through our partners, we can drop ship non-returnable book orders anywhere in the world! Starting with minimum orders of 50 copies, we will prepare an estimate for your approval. Support independent books stores and students in DC city schools, with a portion of our book sales going toward purchasing books for local students.

Contact Denise for more information about bulk book orders.

“On soft Spring nights I’ll stand in the yard under the stars – Something good will come out of all things yet – And it will be golden and eternal just like that – There’s no need to say another word.”

―Jack Kerouac, Big Sur